Vets to White House — “Stop these wars”

Re-reporting, editing by Carolyn Bennett
We see our power when we use it collectively, standing together — Stop these wars — 

“This is the message that should come from the White House … if truth were the coin of the realm. We will not hear it but that makes it no less true.” — Veterans for Peace —


“There is no such thing as ‘non combat troops.’ [The notion of] ‘Non combat troops’ is a contradiction in terms. It is internally inconsistent. It is illogical. It is simply not true.” Ask any of the millions of men and women who have gone through basic training. Every U.S. troop anywhere in the world receives indoctrination and training in the basics of combat. The transition from mechanics or communications back to combat-ready soldier takes but an order.

‘Non-combat troops’ is simply the latest in a long line of military euphemisms meant to obscure painful reality. Part two of President Obama’s speech if drafted by Veterans for Peace would include these remarks.

“Let us begin a new era of candor and honesty about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan,” laying out the true costs of war.

Taxpayers
The cost to taxpayers has exceeded a trillion dollars, nearly all of which has been considered ‘off budget,' appropriated by extraordinary or ‘supplemental’ spending bills and the figure is but the smaller portion of total projected spending on the wars.

We are investing unprecedented sums in Veterans Administration staff and facilities, trying to cope with mounting millions of men and women cycling through war zone deployment — many through multiple deployments.

U.S. soldiers and society
Expected are hundreds of thousands of cases of PTSD [posttraumatic stress disorder] and Traumatic Brain Injuries — injuries that are at first often difficult to diagnose; and in the longer term difficult to treat. More thousands will require years, perhaps decades, of long-term care because their injuries have left them so broken that they need round-the-clock attention.

In this new era of candor, we must go further and include in the cost of war what is suffered by families, communities and society as a whole. Volumes have been written on this societal dimension: abnormally high rates of suicide among returning veterans, the exact number undoubtedly higher as some cases remain a mystery; growing domestic violence leaving families broken and terrorized. However, beyond individual and immediate community’s medical, psychological and emotional costs are added pressures on battalions of police, fire, EMT, courts, probation officers, social workers and, sadly, prison guards needed to deal with true costs of war.

People and societies under U.S. invasion, occupation
Finally, there are exponentially greater costs — emotionally, economically, in human suffering, in destroyed opportunities, in shattered lives and minds, in hearts that will remain forever broken — borne by the people of Iraq and Afghanistan. We can do precious little to repair much of this damage but we are duty bound to finance the rebuilding of what we have destroyed — roads, water and sewage plants, hospitals, schools and residences.


Veterans to lead “Civil Resistance against War”  — December 16

“We will carry forward a flame of resistance to the war machine that will not diminish as we effectively begin to place ourselves … ‘upon the gears and upon the wheels, upon the levers, upon all the apparatus’ and we will make it stop.

“The power of courageous, committed people is greater than that of corporate warmongers but we will only see our power when we use it collectively. Standing together with courage, persistence, boldness and numbers, we can eventually make this monstrous war machine grind to a halt — so that people everywhere can grow up in a peaceful world.

“Profit and power-hungry warmongers are destroying everything we hold dear and sacred. Children orphaned, maimed, killed every day in our name. Soldiers and civilians dead, others maimed for life to generate profits for the most odious imperialistic corporate war machine ever. How long until the machine destroys the planet and all human beings?

“Today’s ‘bonus marchers’ come to claim PEACE” — Activist veterans in solidarity are “marching to the White House, refusing to move, demanding the end of U.S. wars, including U.S. support (financial and tactical) for the Israeli war machine.”

Veteran-Led Civil Resistance against War, as of November 19, had been endorsed by —

■Veterans For Peace
■ANSWER
■CodePink
■Fellowship of Reconciliation
■March Forward
■Peace of the Action
■United National Anti-War Committee
■Voices for Creative Non-Violence
■Voters for Peace
■War Resisters League
■Washington Peace Center
■Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom
■World Can’t Wait

How many (est.) in two-theater

U.S.-led WAR DEAD?
Casualty sites reporting November 19, 2010

(accurate totals unknown)

• Anti-war dot com Casualties in Iraq since March 19, 2003

[U.S. war dead since the Obama inauguration January 20, 2009: 199]

Wounded 32,900-100,000

U.S. veterans with brain injuries 320,000

Suicides estimated: 18 a day

Latest update on this site: October 27, 2010

http://www.antiwar.com/casualties/

• Iraq Body Count (civilian deaths from violence) figures:

98,872 – 107,932

http://www.iraqbodycount.org/

• ICasualties figures:

IRAQ: 4,427 U.S., 4,745 Coalition

AFGHANISTAN: 1,398 U.S., 2,224 Coalition

http://icasualties.org/oif/

War reports — Al Jazeera November 16-19

Occupied Territories
“Israel shells Gaza ‘in retaliation’ — Israel fires mortar shells at three targets in the Gaza Strip, calling it a response to rocket fire from the territory”

Two Palestinian brothers, ages 20 and 39, died (three bystanders suffered wounds) Wednesday when an Israeli missile struck and “completely destroyed the back of their car in the Samer area of Gaza City. On November 3, Israeli warplanes fired a missile at another car in Gaza City, killing Mohammed al-Nemnem, whom the Israeli military said was a senior member of the [Army of Islam] and a ‘ticking bomb.’”

U.S. [remote] war on Pakistan/Afghanistan
Twenty (est.) people died Tuesday when a U.S. missile launched from drones struck a fortress-like compound and a vehicle in Ghulam Khan Village in North Waziristan, Pakistan’s tribal area close to the border with Afghanistan.

“The U.S. has stepped up missile strikes by unmanned drones in recent months as it struggles to stabilize war-ravaged Afghanistan.” In more than 40 strikes since September 3, more than 220 people have died.

Sources
“If we were Obama...a response to Obama’ troop ‘withdrawal’” (Mike Ferner), August 31, 2010,
http://www.veteransforpeace.org/If_we_were_obama.vp.html


“WELCOME TO STOP THESE WARS Join Us For Peace on Earth! Take a Stand for Peace!”
Posted on November 19, 2010, http://www.stopthesewars.org/


http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2010/11/20101117203849523358.html
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2010/11/20101116667386262.html

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Bennett's books available in New York State independent bookstores: Lift Bridge Bookshop: www.liftbridgebooks.com [Brockport, NY]; Sundance Books: http://www.sundancebooks.com/main.html [Geneseo, NY]; The Book Den, Ltd.: BookDenLtd@frontiernet.net [Danville, NY]; Talking Leaves Books-Elmwood: talking.leaves.elmwood@gmail.com [Buffalo, NY]; Book House of Stuyvesant Plaza: http://www.bhny.com/ [Albany, NY]; Mood Makers Books: www.moodmakersbooks.com [City of Rochester, NY]; Dog Ears Bookstore and Literary Arts Center: www.enlightenthedog.org/ [Buffalo, NY]; Burlingham Books – ‘Your Local Chapter’: http://burlinghambooks.com/ [Perry, NY 14530]; The Bookworm: http://www.eabookworm.com/ [East Aurora, NY]; LONGS’ Cards and Books: http://longscardsandbooks.com/ [Penn Yan, NY]

War multiplied in 40s, veteran costs, debt, trillions rise

Re-reporting, excerpting, compiling, editing by Carolyn Bennett From “How Iraq and Afghanistan wars are crippling the U.S. economy” by Professor Linda J. Bilmes, co-author of The Three Trillion Dollar War: The True Cost of the Iraq Conflict

Costs and consequences of wars last centuries

Between 2003 and 2008—before the financial crisis unfolded—the debt rose from $6.4 trillion to $10 trillion, and, at least one-quarter of this increase was directly attributable to the wars, first in Iraq and then in Afghanistan.

Spending has risen to more than $1 trillion in Iraq, not counting the $700 billion consumed each year by the Pentagon budget. Spending in Iraq and Afghanistan comes to more than $3 billion weekly, making the wars a major reason for record-level budget deficits.

Considering the new numbers, we now believe our initial estimate [that the budgetary and economic costs of the war would reach $3 trillion] was far too conservative. The cost of the wars will reach between $4 trillion and $6 trillion.

The legacy of wars spans decades.

History shows that the cost of caring for war veterans typically peaks 40 years after conflict ends. Paying out disability claims to World War I veterans peaked in 1969. Paying out disability claims to World War II veterans peaked in the 1980s. Vietnam War veterans’ benefits have not yet peaked. The six-week Gulf War now costs more than $4 billion a year in veterans’ disability compensation.

The long-term costs of the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan will be higher than previous wars because of higher survival rates, greater incidence of PTSD and other mental-health disorders.

Hundreds of thousands of veterans have received treatment in VA medical facilities. Many will require care for the rest of their lives. More than half-a-million people have filed for disability compensation.

The total lifetime cost of providing for veterans [not including materiel replacement] is likely to tally between $600 billion and $900 billion.… These huge numbers do not include the economic costs borne by veterans and their families: diminished quality of life, lost employment, and long-term suffering.

This spending (and the accompanying debt) will one day need to be paid [but] we do not care to connect the dots. Iraq and Afghanistan cast a long shadow — a legacy we will live with for decades.

Source and notes


Writer Linda J. Bilmes is a Harvard Kennedy School of Government professor and co-author of The Three Trillion Dollar War: The True Cost of the Iraq Conflict. Major newspapers, magazines and academic journals have published her articles on financial and budgetary issues.

“How Iraq and Afghanistan wars are crippling the U.S. economy (Linda J. Bilmes, Daily Beast) October 30, 2010, http://stopwar.org.uk/content/view/2129/27/

How many (est.) in two-theater

U.S.-led

WAR DEAD?

Casualty sites reporting November 5, 2010

(accurate totals unknown)

• Anti-war dot com Casualties in Iraq since March 19, 2003

[U.S. war dead since the Obama inauguration January 20, 2009: 199]

Wounded 32,900-100,000

U.S. veterans with brain injuries 320,000

Suicides estimated: 18 a day

Latest update on this site: October 24, 2010

http://www.antiwar.com/casualties/

• Iraq Body Count (civilian deaths from violence) figures:

98,691 – 107,707

http://www.iraqbodycount.org/

• ICasualties figures:

IRAQ: 4,427 U.S., 4,745 Coalition

AFGHANISTAN: 1,378 U.S., 2,203 Coalition

http://icasualties.org/oif/

FOR THIS AND MORE

"Remembrance"

World War II veteran Richard Charlifue, 85, of Aurora, Colorado, remembers “hell on Earth.”

The dead were everywhere their skin rotting, bodies infested with maggots and mosquitoes — I could not believe the stench of human dead.


One day he is standing guard with a fellow soldier. A Japanese soldier appears from the foliage his hands raised in surrender. We had orders to take no prisoners and “My buddy kept saying, ‘shoot him.’ I could not do it.… ‘Discretion is the better part of valor’ — one human being refusing to kill a helpless human being.”


Saipan was such a “beautiful tropical island” but the experience there was “hell on Earth.”

Sources and notes
“Aurora WWII veteran reflects on war, his life after service” (David Pollan), November 8, 2010,
http://www.aurorasentinel.com/living/features/visual_features/article_d106b3f8-eb59-11df-af95-001cc4c002e0.html

Saipan was under Spanish sovereignty from 1565 to 1899. It then came under German rule (1899–1914) and was a Japanese mandate from 1920 until captured (1944) by U.S. forces during World War II. It became an important U.S. military air base during the latter part of the war. Between 1953 and 1962, it was under U.S. naval jurisdiction and from 1962 to 1986 Saipan served as headquarters of the U.S.-administered United Nations Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands. The island is part of the U.S. Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands in the western Pacific Ocean [Britannica notes].

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Bennett's books available at New York independent bookstores: Lift Bridge Bookshop: www.liftbridgebooks.com [Brockport, NY]; Sundance Books: http://www.sundancebooks.com/main.html [Geneseo, NY]; The Book Den, Ltd.: BookDenLtd@frontiernet.net [Danville, NY] Talking Leaves Books-Elmwood: talking.leaves.elmwood@gmail.com [Buffalo, NY]; Book House of Stuyvesant Plaza: http://www.bhny.com/ [Albany, NY]; Mood Makers Books: www.moodmakersbooks.com [City of Rochester, NY] Dog Ears Bookstore and Literary Arts Center: www.enlightenthedog.org/ [Buffalo, NY] Burlingham Books – ‘Your Local Chapter’: http://burlinghambooks.com/ [Perry, NY 14530] The Bookworm: http://www.eabookworm.com/ [East Aurora, NY]